


i could make you smile if you stayed a while

by ladynox



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: 2x06 morning after, 2x06 positive, Episode: s02e06 Sex and Candy, F/M, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, M/M, Maria DeLuca Positive, Maria's POV, Multi, Sort of a fix it, Stream of Consciousness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-20
Updated: 2021-01-20
Packaged: 2021-03-18 12:41:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28867176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladynox/pseuds/ladynox
Summary: The morning after The Threesome was full of uncertainty. Maria sorts through the emotional aftermath of the night before.
Relationships: Maria DeLuca/Michael Guerin, background Michael Guerin/Alex Manes
Comments: 20
Kudos: 28





	i could make you smile if you stayed a while

**Author's Note:**

> A big thank you to Cath and Beautifulcheat for all your input, betaing and cheerleading. You two are the best.

Maria isn’t the last to wake but she’s the last to stir, still lying on Michael’s small, too thin mattress, a threadbare sheet the only thing covering her nakedness. The airstream smells like engine grease, coffee and a storm cloud. 

“Too cold now,” Maria mutters to herself, pressing her nose into Michael’s pillow and wishing she could turn back the clock just a couple of hours. 

“Sorry.” Michael, voice soft and a little amused. It’s just the two of them, Alex’s familiar, protective presence missing from the airstream but not entirely gone from her perception. Pacing along the outskirts of it. Maria senses, as she always could when Alex was close, his emotions, conflicted. 

“Always a problem with living heaters, they move,” Michael continues, rehashing an old joke. Maria wants to laugh at that. She has before, pressing close to leech his heat, cold fingers finding their way under his shirt, seeking out smooth, warm skin. But she can’t bring herself to right now. Not when she’s overwhelmed with the desire to go back to last night, uncomfortably squished up between the wall and Michael’s bulk. It had actually been almost too warm then, between Alex and Michael.

But the discomfort of cramped spaces and too much body heat had been preferable over the anxiety of almost losing them. It’s still preferable. Only now her fear has nothing to do with crazy white guys in cornfields. 

The sudden weight of a heavy blanket pulls her away from those thoughts. Michael adjusts the blanket so she’s fully covered and then smoothes a hand down her arm over the layers. She feels warm again but knows it has nothing to do with the blanket. Proof positive when Michael moves away, to get his jeans on by the sound of rustling denim. 

Maria sighs, presses her nose back into Michael’s pillow. 

Last night Michael’s aura was dark and grey like a storm, troubled and worried. Shades of red and yellow shooting through it like lightning--fear, anger, yearning. Maria stood up to reassure him. It was ok.  _ They  _ were ok. Michael had leaned in just a little, almost imperceptible, eyes unsure. 

At that moment, as she kissed him, offering comfort and gaining it in return, Maria had realized just how badly she missed him. 

No, not missed him.  _ Loved _ him. She always misses him. Even before they started dating, even before Texas, she’d miss his presence in her bar. Even if all he did was end up causing her trouble, racked up costs in damages and stolen booze, she liked having him there, with his affected swagger and sly flirtatious smile that was nothing but warm when turned on her. 

And sure, post fear and adrenaline, she could have been feeling overly romantic. Maria could have been looking back at the banter and thrown barbs, the heated looks, the accidental touches, as a precursor to Texas, to now. But whatever the case, in that moment, kissing Michael, Maria had felt like a piece of a puzzle had clicked into place.

And in that moment while Maria was realizing how much she needed Michael in her life, Alex had been ready to walk away, head held high. Heart breaking.

Maybe she should have let him. For all their sakes. 

Maria recoils from that thought immediately. Exhales loudly through her nose, frustrated. Like a trapped bull. Trapped by her love of two men and a whole lot of uncertainty.

\-- 

The bed dips and she opens her eyes to find Michael’s broad back to her as he slips on his boots. Sensing her eyes on him, he pauses, looking back at her. He’s nervous. Already thinking too much. They’re all  _ thinking too much,  _ damnit, and she can’t figure out how to stop it. 

“Alex’s outside,” he says, still holding one of his boots in hand. The nerves increase, she can tell by the way his nail scratches at some speck of dirt on his boot, by how intent he is on eye contact. Michael knows what he  _ wants _ to do (that makes one of them at least, she thinks bitterly) but he’s not sure  _ what _ to do.

“I know,” Maria replies, pushing her hair out of her eyes, a tangled mess she’s in no mood to bother with right now. She looks at Michael. His hair’s a mess too. Alex and Maria’s fault more than sleep’s. The thought brings a smile to her face that doesn’t quite reach her eyes. She’s sure all Michael sees there are her nerves reflected back at him.

Outside, Alex continues to move along her perception, sentry-like now. Protective. 

Maria shores up her bravado. “Someone should go talk to him.”

Michael nods and squeezes her hand, grateful, before standing. She watches his back as he shrugs on a shirt, grabs a cup of coffee and heads out the door. It closes quietly behind him and Maria’s chest tightens. She rolls onto her back, looks up at the ceiling, and worries the inside of her cheek.

There’s just enough space in the newspaper covering the windows to allow her to look out into the junkyard and see Alex and Michael talking. She doesn’t look. And she doesn’t peek into their emotions, either, forcibly blocking them out. Spoilers and all. Instead she grabs one of Michael’s discarded hoodies, an ugly grey and red striped number that she wouldn’t normally be caught dead in if it wasn’t for the fact that she was naked. 

No, if she didn’t feel like she was losing Michael, just when she’s realizing that she could love him. Maybe already does. She wants the banter, wants to give him crap and watch him laugh. Wants to wake up to the weight of him on her, almost intolerable. But she tolerates it anyway because Michael likes to sleep half on top of her and his presence was comforting and reassuring even if it was too damn much sometimes. She wants to be who he comes to when in need of comforting too--reassurance, like last night--when he needs someone to lean on. 

He always talks about wanting to be good for someone, but she wants to be good for him just as much.

And in the silent, empty airstream, she can feel that opportunity slipping through her fingers. 

Or maybe it is Alex she’s losing, even though yesterday he had said that nothing could make him stop loving her. But that was easy enough to say when Maria and Michael had been on the outs. 

Maria frowns, pushes away the sudden desire to cry. Her frustrations need the outlet. But not yet. Not here. 

She isn’t the jealous type but she had noticed the way Alex looked at Michael last night, with the intensity of a dying man seeking salvation. All the while, Michael's eyes--whiskey brown and yearning--kept skirting from Alex to her to anywhere but them and back to her. On a circuit of uncertainty. 

No, Maria isn’t jealous. But lord, the way they kissed. They were both handsome men but together they were achingly beautiful, and Maria  _ felt _ that ache acutely. Like it was her own. Michael and Alex kissed like they were both trying to get as much of each other while they could. Because they had both known what Maria, in her own naivety, hadn’t: what was happening then was finite. The sun would rise, bathing them in the reality of the situation. 

Maria is also not the type to wallow in self pity but… someone has to be burned by that light, right? 

She doesn’t doubt Michael’s feelings for her. But she would be fooling herself if she didn’t acknowledge that Michael and Alex are still very much in love with each other. Baggage is the reason they aren’t together. And right now, outside, they’re sorting through it.

Feeling uncharitable and like a shitty friend, Maria acknowledges that’s a boon for her. Maria and Michael are free to love each other without anger and violence and homophobia. Maria’s the easy choice. The safe choice. Michael is smart enough to realize that. 

“God that’s fucked up, Deluca,” she groans and rubs her eyes until colors burst before them. If she didn’t think Alex and Michael would hear, she’d bang her head against the wall. Knock out all those self pitying, fucked up thoughts. She loves Michael but she has too much self respect to be second best. 

Maria loves them both too much to be a barrier to their happiness.

So if there is a chance they can be happy together, she will accept it gracefully. She will pull off Guerin’s hoodie and put on her clothes covered in dirt and Alex’s blood, and do her walk of shame. Head held high. Heart breaking.

And it will be worth it for Alex’s friendship. No for Alex’s happiness. Because as much as she wants to be the reason for Michael’s happiness, she also wants to be the reason Alex is happy. Even if it’s by proxy of Michael. 

“God,” Maria half groans, half laughs. The tears are back and it’s harder this time to push them back. 

But as complicated and stressful as things are right now, Maria doesn’t regret last night at all. Sure, it had been about fear, stress and reassurance but it had also been about love. Because while the three of them were in this tiny bed together, laughing every time an elbow painfully dug into someone’s rib cage, there had not been one moment where Maria had felt left out. Their love for each other, for her, had been like a cup overflowing and none of them could get enough. She realizes, now, that while Michael and Alex had seen that beautiful moment as ephemeral, she hadn’t.    
  
Maria hadn’t been naive, but hopeful. She had looked at the love in Michael’s gaze, had felt the conviction in his arms as he pulled them both closer. Touched and kissed them like he could somehow pull them both inside, envelope them in that big heart of his… And Alex, always so reserved, guarded, had been so soft and open with his needs in that Alex way that was somehow still all frowns and intensity. Fingers tight in Michael’s hair, Alex pulled away from Michael’s kiss and sought her out for another kiss, not the kiss of lovers but a kiss of loved ones… Of belonging…    
  
“Of soulmates?” She asks herself and then laughs softly, derisively. Maria considers herself a pragmatic person, never lets sentimentality get in the way of reality. Just because she’s a Pisces and psychic, didn’t mean her feet aren’t firmly on the ground. But, God, last night she realized they could have this forever, or something like this (the love, not the awkward sex) and she’d been fucking right. She  _ knows _ she’s right. She’s just not sure about the details, yet.

The door opens, saving her from spiraling thoughts. She blinks, her eyes feel extra moist and her voice catches around the lump in her throat, with emotions that are not all sadness and despair, when she asks “You’re not going after him?” Lord, she should have thought a bit harder before speaking. 

“Um,” he begins and her heart eases just a little as he sits down on the bed, meeting her eyes. No nerves this time. “I’m not going anywhere,” he says, looking at her seriously. His eyes are bright, sincere.

She considers his statement. The short duration of his conversation with Alex. The fact Alex was not here with him, on his walk of heartbreak. She hoped it wasn’t shame. 

“Neither am I,” Maria replied, like it was no big thing. Like she hadn’t just spent the entire time spiraling. Like she wasn’t glad that he was here, leaning in to kiss her with that goofy boyish smile of his. All bravado. He’d been worried she’d leave too, could only now see the grey clouds part from his aura. The colors of relief weren’t as bright though, muted by sadness. The pressure of his lips was bittersweet. She understood 

“Alex?” Maria asks when they broke apart.    
  
Michael frowns with concern. “Gone. Maria--”   
  
“It’s ok that you’re still in love with him, Michael.” His eyes widen and she continues before he can start talking, trying to repair something that didn’t need fixing. “That doesn’t affect how you feel about me, I know it.” She rests her hand over his heart. “I can feel it.” 

Michael relaxes minutely under her touch, shifts in closer, carefully rests his forehead against hers, keeps his eyes locked with hers. “Yeah, you’re right. But can’t we forget about it? Just kiss? I thought we were over and…” He pauses now, unsure. Maria tries not to laugh. “We’re not, are we?”   
  
“No, dumbass.” Maria fails. She laughs at him and he pouts.    
  
“It’s a fair question!”    
  
“Is it?”    
  
“I donno.” Michael shrugs, petulant. “I’ve never done this before. There isn’t usually a morning after…”   
  
“I remember there were a few morning afters,” Maria reminds him. “There was even a half decent omelette once or twice.” 

He laughs, softly, relieved, resting his forehead on her shoulder now. She puts an arm around him, pets his hair. She could be content like this, they both could be she thinks. She could make him happy. She wants to make him happy. 

“Alex--”   
  
“Maria,” he sounds exasperated. “I’ve never pegged you as the insecure type.”   
  
“You’re right I’m not,” Maria replied, dryly. “Shut up and let me finish.” 

Michael winds his arms around her waist, squeezing gently, making his point physically since she won’t let him verbally. Maria waits until he settles down, then resumes petting his hair. It works out for her too. She needs to figure out what she’s going to say. 

“We’re still non-exclusive you know,” Maria begins. Michael, bless him, keeps his mouth shut but he gives her such a look. The look was fair too. Because yeah, non-exclusive for her maybe but she had been very explicit that Michael was not to wander. (Not that Maria had been doing any wandering but it was the  _ principle _ of things). “Alex isn’t a Lindsay.” 

Michael’s shocked, mouth hanging open, speechless. A first ladies and gentlemen, she’d savor it but she does not know how long it’ll last.

Maria continues, “so if you want to figure things out with him, you can.”   
  
Michael looks so confused now that she has to kiss him. “I want to be with you,” he says afterwards, kisses her again, deeper, trying to prove it. 

“Did I say otherwise?” She asks, smirking. It’s easier on both their egos, emotions, whatever, if this is all a little challenging. “Aren’t you supposed to be a genius? Can’t figure it out?”    
  
Now he looks kind of salty which makes her want to laugh again. But the caution in his tone as he spoke kept her serious. “You’re offering an open relationship?”    
  
“With Alex,” Maria clarifies immediately. “No Lindsay.”   
  
“Oh my God, Maria,  _ fuck Lindsay _ !” 

“Don’t you dare!” 

And then they can’t help but dissolve into giggles so intense they need to lean against each other for support. They kiss after, languid and slow, no tension, just something happier and affectionate.    
  
“Are we going to talk to Alex?” Michael asks after, voice soft in that way it goes when he’s unsure but he wants. Like Maria, Michael’s a little too pragmatic to let himself get carried away by things that sound too good to be true. Shitty childhoods will do that to you. But she hopes she can show him that you can be hopeful with both feet firmly on the ground.    
  
“I’m not here to fix your problems with Alex, babe,” she says firmly. “You two need to figure that shit out yourselves or it won’t work otherwise. And then maybe after that we can talk about how to move forward as a throuple or something.”   
  
Michael makes a face. “That is a terrible word.”   
  
“Well threesome sounds like fucking and despite what happened last night, I don’t think gay ass Alex wants to see my pussy again any time soon.”    
  
Michael snorts. Kisses her again. “Fair. Shame though. You both are gorgeous,” Michael admits.    
  
She wants to say that Michael is too but he’ll get all gruff about it. Deny it. Because no one has ever taught him how to take a compliment. Something to work on in the future, maybe. They’ve got time, it seems. 

“Are you sure, Maria? Really, really sure?” Michael asks, pulling her out of her considerations. “I do love Alex but I’ve more or less accepted that we’re not going to work.” 

Maria’s quiet while she thinks of the right answer, stroking his cheek.    
  
“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do, Michael. I’m just giving you the option.”    
  
“But you don’t have concerns?”   
  
“Of course I have concerns.” Maria shakes her head. “There’s a small part of me that thinks I’m screwing myself. But I’m willing to take a chance that I’m right and you can love us both, easily. With room to spare.” 

“You trust me,” he says, wonder in his tone. His cheeks flush a second later and Maria realizes he hadn’t meant to say that outloud. No jokes then, Deluca.

“Yeah,” she admits, softly, tucks a few curls behind Michael’s ear. “I do.” 

Michael kisses her again, deep and passionate. They don’t talk again after that. Nothing else needs to be said. 

Things will work out, eventually.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Elliott Smith's Twilight


End file.
